German forces invaded Poland from the north, south, and west the morning after the Gleiwitz incident. Slovak forces advanced alongside the Germans in northern Slovakia. As the Wehrmacht advanced, Polish forces withdrew from their forward bases of operation close to the Polish–German border to more established lines of defence to the east. After the mid-September Polish defeat in the Battle of the Bzura, the Germans gained an undisputed advantage. Polish forces then withdrew to the southeast where they prepared for a long defence of the Romanian Bridgehead and awaited expected support and relief from France and the United Kingdom.[16] While those two countries had pacts with Poland and had declared war on Germany on 3 September, in the end their aid to Poland was very limited.

The Soviet Red Army's invasion of Eastern Poland on 17 September, in accordance with a secret protocol of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, rendered the Polish plan of defence obsolete.[17] Facing a second front, the Polish government concluded the defence of the Romanian Bridgehead was no longer feasible and ordered an emergency evacuation of all troops to neutral Romania.[18] On 6 October, following the Polish defeat at the Battle of Kock, German and Soviet forces gained full control over Poland. The success of the invasion marked the end of the Second Polish Republic, though Poland never formally surrendered.

On 30 January 1933, the National Socialist German Workers' Party, under its leader Adolf Hitler, came to power in Germany.[19] While the Weimar Republic had long sought to annex territories belonging to Poland, it was Hitler's own idea and not a realization of Weimar plans to invade and partition Poland,[20] annex Bohemia and Austria, and create satellite or puppet states economically subordinate to Germany.[21] As part of this long-term policy, Hitler at first pursued a policy of rapprochement with Poland, trying to improve opinion in Germany, culminating in the German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact of 1934.[22] Earlier, Hitler's foreign policy worked to weaken ties between Poland and France, and attempted to manoeuvre Poland into the Anti-Comintern Pact, forming a cooperative front against the Soviet Union.[22][23] Poland would be granted territory to its northeast in Ukraine and Belarus if it agreed to wage war against the Soviet Union, but the concessions the Poles were expected to make meant that their homeland would become largely dependent on Germany, functioning as little more than a client state. The Poles feared that their independence would eventually be threatened altogether;[23]historically Hitler on his part denounced the right of Poland to independence already in 1930, writing that Poles and Czechs are a “rabble not worth a penny more than the inhabitants of Sudan or India. How can they demand the rights of independent states?”[24]

The population of the Free City of Danzig was strongly in favour of annexation by Germany, as were many of the ethnic German inhabitants of the Polish territory that separated the German exclave of East Prussia from the rest of the Reich.[25] The so-called Polish Corridor constituted land long disputed by Poland and Germany, and inhabited by a Polish majority. The Corridor had become a part of Poland after the Treaty of Versailles. Many Germans also wanted the city of Danzig and its environs (together the Free City of Danzig) to be reincorporated into Germany. Danzig was a port city with a German majority.[26] It had been separated from Germany after Versailles and made into the nominally independent Free City of Danzig. Hitler sought to use this as a reason for war, reverse these territorial losses, and on many occasions made an appeal to German nationalism, promising to "liberate" the German minority still in the Corridor, as well as Danzig.[27]

The invasion was referred to by Germany as the 1939 Defensive War since Hitler proclaimed that Poland had attacked Germany and that "Germans in Poland are persecuted with a bloody terror and are driven from their homes. The series of border violations, which are unbearable to a great power, prove that the Poles no longer are willing to respect the German frontier."[28]

Poland participated with Germany in the partition of Czechoslovakia that followed the Munich Agreement, although they were not part of the agreement. It coerced Czechoslovakia to surrender the region of Český Těšín by issuing an ultimatum to that effect on 30 September 1938, which was accepted by Czechoslovakia on 1 October.[29] This region had a Polish majority and had been disputed between Czechoslovakia and Poland in the aftermath of World War I.[30][31] The Polish annexation of Slovak territory (several villages in the regions of Čadca, Orava and Spiš) later served as the justification for the Slovak state to join the German invasion.

By 1937, Germany began to increase its demands for Danzig, while proposing that an extraterritorial roadway, part of the Reichsautobahn system, be built in order to connect East Prussia with Germany proper, running through the Polish Corridor.[32] Poland rejected this proposal, fearing that after accepting these demands, it would become increasingly subject to the will of Germany and eventually lose its independence as the Czechs had.[33] Polish leaders also distrusted Hitler.[33] Furthermore, Germany's collaboration with anti-Polish Ukrainian nationalists from the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists[citation needed], which was seen as an effort to isolate and weaken Poland, weakened Hitler's credibility from the Polish point of view. The British were also wary of Germany's increasing strength and assertiveness threatening its balance of power strategy.[34] On 31 March 1939, Poland formed a military alliance with the United Kingdom and France, believing that Polish independence and territorial integrity would be defended with their support if it were to be threatened by Germany.[35] On the other hand, British Prime MinisterNeville Chamberlain and his Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, still hoped to strike a deal with Hitler regarding Danzig (and possibly the Polish Corridor). Chamberlain and his supporters believed war could be avoided and hoped Germany would agree to leave the rest of Poland alone. German hegemony over Central Europe was also at stake. In private, Hitler said in May that Danzig was not the important issue to him, but pursuit of Lebensraum for Germany.[36]

With tensions mounting, Germany turned to aggressive diplomacy. On 28 April 1939, Hitler unilaterally withdrew from both the German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact of 1934 and the London Naval Agreement of 1935. Talks over Danzig and the Corridor broke down and months passed without diplomatic interaction between Germany and Poland. During this interim period, the Germans learned that France and Britain had failed to secure an alliance with the Soviet Union against Germany, and that the Soviet Union was interested in an alliance with Germany against Poland. Hitler had already issued orders to prepare for a possible "solution of the Polish problem by military means" through the Case White scenario.

In May 1939, in a statement to his generals while they were in the midst of planning the invasion of Poland, Hitler made it clear that the invasion would not come without resistance as it had in Czechoslovakia:[37]

With minor exceptions German national unification has been achieved. Further successes cannot be achieved without bloodshed. Poland will always be on the side of our adversaries... Danzig is not the objective. It is a matter of expanding our living space in the east, of making our food supply secure, and solving the problem of the Baltic states. To provide sufficient food you must have sparsely settled areas. There is therefore no question of sparing Poland, and the decision remains to attack Poland at the first opportunity. We cannot expect a repetition of Czechoslovakia. There will be fighting.[37]

On August 22, just over a week before the onset of war, Hitler delivered a speech to his military commanders at the Obersalzberg:

The object of the war is … physically to destroy the enemy. That is why I have prepared, for the moment only in the East, my 'Death's Head' formations with orders to kill without pity or mercy all men, women, and children of Polish descent or language. Only in this way can we obtain the living space we need. [38]

With the surprise signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact on 23 August, the result of secret Nazi–Soviet talks held in Moscow, Germany neutralized the possibility of Soviet opposition to a campaign against Poland and war became imminent. In fact, the Soviets agreed not to aid France or the UK in the event of their going to war with Germany over Poland and, in a secret protocol of the pact, the Germans and the Soviets agreed to divide Eastern Europe, including Poland, into two spheres of influence; the western ​1⁄3 of the country was to go to Germany and the eastern ​2⁄3 to the Soviet Union.

The German assault was originally scheduled to begin at 04:00 on 26 August. However, on 25 August, the Polish-British Common Defense Pact was signed as an annex to the Franco-Polish Military Alliance. In this accord, Britain committed itself to the defence of Poland, guaranteeing to preserve Polish independence. At the same time, the British and the Poles were hinting to Berlin that they were willing to resume discussions—not at all how Hitler hoped to frame the conflict. Thus, he wavered and postponed his attack until 1 September, managing to in effect halt the entire invasion "in mid-leap".

However, there was one exception: on the night of 25–6 August, a German sabotage group which had not heard anything about a delay of the invasion made an attack on the Jablunkov Pass and Mosty railway station in Silesia. On the morning of 26 August, this group was repelled by Polish troops. The German side described all this as an incident "caused by an insane individual" (see Jabłonków Incident).

On 26 August, Hitler tried to dissuade the British and the French from interfering in the upcoming conflict, even pledging that the Wehrmacht forces would be made available to Britain's empire in the future.[39][40] The negotiations convinced Hitler that there was little chance the Western Allies would declare war on Germany, and even if they did, because of the lack of "territorial guarantees" to Poland, they would be willing to negotiate a compromise favourable to Germany after its conquest of Poland. Meanwhile, the increased number of overflights by high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft and cross-border troop movements signaled that war was imminent.

The map shows the beginning of World War II in September 1939 in a European context.

On 29 August, prompted by the British, Germany issued one last diplomatic offer, with Fall Weiss yet to be rescheduled. That evening, the German government responded in a communication that it aimed not only for the restoration of Danzig but also the Polish Corridor (which had not previously been part of Hitler’s demands) in addition to the safeguarding of the German minority in Poland. It said that they were willing to commence negotiations, but indicated that a Polish representative with the power to sign an agreement had to arrive in Berlin the next day while in the meantime it would draw up a set of proposals.[41] The British Cabinet was pleased that negotiations had been agreed to but, mindful of how Emil Hácha had been forced to sign his country away under similar circumstances just months earlier, regarded the requirement for an immediate arrival of a Polish representative with full signing powers as an unacceptable ultimatum.[42][43] On the night of 30/31 August, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop read a 16-point German proposal to the British ambassador. When the ambassador requested a copy of the proposals for transmission to the Polish government, Ribbentrop refused, on the grounds that the requested Polish representative had failed to arrive by midnight.[44] When Polish Ambassador Lipski went to see Ribbentrop later on 31 August to indicate that Poland was favorably disposed to negotiations, he announced that he did not have the full power to sign, and Ribbentrop dismissed him. It was then broadcast that Poland had rejected Germany's offer, and negotiations with Poland came to an end. Hitler issued orders for the invasion to commence soon afterwards.

On 29 August, Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jozef Beck ordered mobilization, but under the pressure from Great Britain and France, the mobilization was cancelled. When the final mobilization started, it added to the confusion.[45]

On 30 August, the Polish Navy sent its destroyer flotilla to Britain, executing the Peking Plan. On the same day, Marshal of PolandEdward Rydz-Śmigły announced the mobilization of Polish troops. However, he was pressured into revoking the order by the French, who apparently still hoped for a diplomatic settlement, failing to realize that the Germans were fully mobilized and concentrated at the Polish border.[46] During the night of 31 August, the Gleiwitz incident, a false flag attack on the radio station, was staged near the border city of Gleiwitz in Upper Silesia by German units posing as Polish troops, as part of the wider Operation Himmler.[47] On 31 August 1939, Hitler ordered hostilities against Poland to start at 4:45 the next morning. Because of the earlier stoppage, Poland managed to mobilize only 70% of its planned forces, and many units were still forming or moving to their designated frontline positions.

The Polish "Lecomte" intelligence unit located in Paris, under the leadership of Michał Baliński, concerned with the East European affairs, but under the command of the Western European intelligence services, on 22 August 1939, delivered information that the Soviet-Nazi talks have entered a new phase.

"Intense Soviet-German negotiations. The attack against Poland in between August 26 and August 28. As of September 4, 1939, the former border between Prussian and Russian empires is to be reached. Afterward, negotiations through Mussolini(...)" This message was dated August 21, 1939, and received August 24, 1939.[48]

This message meant that the Germans were to stop over 100 kilometers west from Warsaw. The Germans also wanted to establish a Polish puppet state, but Stalin was against. This message can also help to explain why the Polish forces were deployed to every corner of Western Poland; albeit the deployment of forces inside of the Polish Corridor and the strengthening of the Polish Land Coastal Defence was a mistake as shown by the Battle of Tuchola Forest, and Battle of Kępa Oksywska where 9,000 Poles had to defend the positions prepared for at most 5,000 soldiers; the defensive positions were simply overcrowded.

Germany had a substantial numeric advantage over Poland and had developed a significant military before the conflict. The Heer (army) had 3,472 tanks in its inventory, of which 2,859 were with the Field Army and 408 with the Replacement Army.[49] 453 tanks were assigned into four light divisions, while another 225 tanks were in detached regiments and companies.[50] Most notably, the Germans had seven panzer divisions, with 2,009 tanks between them, utilizing a new operational doctrine.[51] It held that these divisions should act in coordination with other elements of the military, punching holes in the enemy line and isolating selected units, which would be encircled and destroyed. This would be followed up by less-mobile mechanized infantry and foot soldiers. The Luftwaffe (air force) provided both tactical and strategic air power, particularly dive bombers that disrupted lines of supply and communications. Together, the new methods were nicknamed "Blitzkrieg" (lightning war). While historian Basil Liddell Hart claimed "Poland was a full demonstration of the Blitzkrieg theory",[52]some other historians disagree.[53]

Aircraft played a major role in the campaign. Bombers also attacked cities, causing huge losses amongst the civilian population through terror bombing and strafing. The Luftwaffe forces consisted of 1,180 fighters, 290 Ju 87 Stukadive bombers, 1,100 conventional bombers (mainly Heinkel He 111s and Dornier Do 17s), and an assortment of 550 transport and 350 reconnaissance aircraft.[54][55] In total, Germany had close to 4,000 aircraft, most of them modern. A force of 2,315 aircraft was assigned to Weiss.[56] Due to its earlier participation in the Spanish Civil War, the Luftwaffe was probably the most experienced, best-trained and best-equipped air force in the world in 1939.[57]

Between 1936 and 1939, Poland invested heavily in the Central Industrial Region. Preparations for a defensive war with Germany were ongoing for many years, but most plans assumed fighting would not begin before 1942. To raise funds for industrial development, Poland sold much of the modern equipment it produced.[58] In 1936, a National Defence Fund was set up to collect funds necessary for strengthening the Polish Armed forces. The Polish Army had approximately a million soldiers, but less than half were mobilized by 1 September. Latecomers sustained significant casualties when public transport became targets of the Luftwaffe. The Polish military had fewer armored forces than the Germans, and these units, dispersed within the infantry, were unable to effectively engage the Germans.[59]

Experiences in the Polish-Soviet War shaped Polish Army organizational and operational doctrine. Unlike the trench warfare of World War I, the Polish-Soviet War was a conflict in which the cavalry's mobility played a decisive role.[60] Poland acknowledged the benefits of mobility but was unable to invest heavily in many of the expensive, unproven inventions since then. In spite of this, Polish cavalrybrigades were used as a mobile mounted infantry and had some successes against both German infantry and cavalry.[61]

The Polish Air Force (Lotnictwo Wojskowe) was at a severe disadvantage against the German Luftwaffe due to inferiority in numbers and obsolescence of its fighter planes. However, contrary to German propaganda, it was not destroyed on the ground - in fact it was successfully dispersed before the conflict started and not a single one of its combat planes was destroyed on the ground in the first days of the conflict [62]. The Polish Air Force lacked modern fighters, but its pilots were among the world's best trained, as proven a year later in the Battle of Britain, in which the Poles played a major part.[63]

Overall, the Germans enjoyed numerical and qualitative aircraft superiority. Poland had only about 600 aircraft, of which only 37 P-37 Łoś bombers were modern and comparable to its German counterparts. The Polish Air Force had roughly 185 PZL P.11 and some 95 PZL P.7 fighters, 175 PZL.23 Karaś Bs, 35 Karaś As, and by September, over 100 PZL.37s were produced.[Note 5] However, for the September Campaign, only some 70% of those aircraft were mobilized. Only 36 PZL.37s were deployed. All those aircraft were of indigenous Polish design, with the bombers being more modern than fighters, according to the Ludomił Rayski air force expansion plan, which relied on a strong bomber force. The Polish Air Force consisted of a 'Bomber Brigade', 'Pursuit Brigade' and aircraft assigned to the various ground armies.[65] The Polish fighters were older than their German counterparts; the PZL P.11 fighter—produced in the early 1930s—had a top speed of only 365 km/h (227 mph), far less than German bombers. To compensate, the pilots relied on its maneuverability and high diving speed.[66]

Polish 7TP light tanks in formation during the first days of the invasion

The tank force consisted of two armored brigades, four independent tank battalions and some 30 companies of TKS tankettes attached to infantry divisions and cavalry brigades.
[67] A standard tank of the Polish Army during the invasion of 1939 was the 7TP light tank. It was the first tank in the world to be equipped with a diesel engine and 360° Gundlach periscope.[68] The 7TP was significantly better armed than its most common opponents, the German Panzer I and II, but only 140 tanks were produced between 1935 and the outbreak of the war. Poland had also a few relatively modern imported designs, such as 50 Renault R35 tanks and 38 Vickers E tanks.

Dispositions of the opposing forces on 31 August 1939 with the German order of battle overlaid in pink.

The September Campaign was devised by General Franz Halder, chief of the general staff, and directed by General Walther von Brauchitsch, the commander in chief of the upcoming campaign. It called for the start of hostilities before a declaration of war, and pursued a doctrine of mass encirclement and destruction of enemy forces. The infantry—far from completely mechanized but fitted with fast-moving artillery and logistic support—was to be supported by Panzers and small numbers of truck-mounted infantry (the Schützen regiments, forerunners of the panzergrenadiers) to assist the rapid movement of troops and concentrate on localized parts of the enemy front, eventually isolating segments of the enemy, surrounding, and destroying them. The pre-war "armored idea" (which an American journalist in 1939 dubbed Blitzkrieg)—which was advocated by some generals, including Heinz Guderian—would have had the armor punching holes in the enemy's front and ranging deep into rear areas; in actuality, the campaign in Poland would be fought along more traditional lines. This stemmed from conservatism on the part of the German high command, who mainly restricted the role of armor and mechanized forces to supporting the conventional infantry divisions.

Polish Infantryman, 1939

Poland's terrain was well suited for mobile operations when the weather cooperated; the country had flat plains with long frontiers totalling almost 5,600 km (3,500 mi), Poland's long border with Germany on the west and north—facing East Prussia—extended 2,000 km (1,200 mi). Those had been lengthened by another 300 km (190 mi) on the southern side in the aftermath of the Munich Agreement of 1938. The German incorporation of Bohemia and Moravia and creation of the German puppet state of Slovakia meant that Poland's southern flank was also exposed.

Hitler demanded that Poland be conquered in six weeks, but German planners thought that it would require three months.[69] They intended to fully exploit their long border with the great enveloping manoeuver of Fall Weiss. German units were to invade Poland from three directions:

A main attack over the western Polish border. This was to be carried out by Army Group South commanded by Colonel General Gerd von Rundstedt, attacking from German Silesia and from the Moravian and Slovak border: General Johannes Blaskowitz's 8th Army was to drive eastward against Łódź; General Wilhelm List's 14th Army was to push on toward Kraków and to turn the Poles' Carpathian flank; and General Walter von Reichenau's 10th Army, in the centre with Army Group South's armor, was to deliver the decisive blow with a northeastward thrust into the heart of Poland.

Deployment of German, Polish, and Slovak divisions immediately before the German invasion.

The Polish determination to deploy forces directly at the German-Polish border, prompted by the Polish-British Common Defense Pact, shaped the country's defence plan, "Plan West". Poland's most valuable natural resources, industry and population were located along the western border in Eastern Upper Silesia. Polish policy centred on their protection especially since many politicians feared that if Poland were to retreat from the regions disputed by Germany, Britain and France would sign a separate peace treaty with Germany similar to the Munich Agreement of 1938.[70] The fact that none of Poland's allies had specifically guaranteed Polish borders or territorial integrity didn't help in easing Polish concerns. For these reasons, the Polish government disregarded French advice to deploy the bulk of its forces behind natural barriers such as the Vistula and San rivers, even though some Polish generals supported it as a better strategy. The West Plan did permit the Polish armies to retreat inside the country, but it was supposed to be a slow retreat behind prepared positions and was intended to give the armed forces time to complete its mobilization and execute a general counteroffensive with the support of the Western Allies.[71]

A camouflaged Polish P-11 fighter at a combat airfield

The Polish General Staff had not begun elaborating the "West" defence plan until 4 March 1939. It was assumed that the Polish Army, fighting in the initial phase of the war alone, would be compelled to defend the western regions of the country. The plan of operations took into account, first of all, the numerical and material superiority of the enemy and, consequently, assumed the defensive character of Polish operations. The Polish intentions were: defence of the western regions judged as indispensable for waging the war, taking advantage of the propitious conditions for counterattacks by reserve units, and avoidance of being smashed before the beginning of Franco/British operations in Western Europe. The operational plan had not been elaborated in detail and concerned only the first stage of operations.[72]

The British and French estimated that Poland would be able to defend itself for two to three months, while Poland estimated it could do so for at least six months. While Poland drafted its estimates based upon the expectation that the Western Allies would honor their treaty obligations and quickly start an offensive of their own, the French and British expected the war to develop into trench warfare much like World War I. The Polish government was not notified of this strategy and based all of its defence plans on promises of quick relief by their Western allies.[73][74]

Polish forces were stretched thinly along the Polish-German border and lacked compact defence lines and good defence positions along disadvantageous terrain. This strategy also left supply lines poorly protected. One-third of Poland's forces were massed in or near the Polish Corridor, making them vulnerable to a double envelopment from East Prussia and the west. Another third were concentrated in the north-central part of the country, between the major cities of Łódź and Warsaw.[75] The forward positioning of Polish forces vastly increased the difficulty of carrying out strategic maneuvers, compounded by inadequate mobility, as Polish units often lacked the ability to retreat from their defensive positions as they were being overrun by more mobile German mechanized formations.[76]

As the prospect of conflict increased, the British government pressed Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły to evacuate the most modern elements of the Polish Navy from the Baltic Sea.[77] In the event of war the Polish military leaders realized that the ships which remained in the Baltic were likely to be quickly sunk by the Germans. Furthermore, the Danish straits were well within operating range of the German Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe, so there was little chance of an evacuation plan succeeding if implemented after hostilities began. Four days after the signing of the Polish-British Common Defense Pact, three destroyers of the Polish Navy executed the Peking Plan and consequently evacuated to Great Britain.[77]

Although the Polish military had prepared for conflict, the civilian population remained largely unprepared. Polish pre-war propaganda emphasized that any German invasion would be easily repelled. Consequently, Polish defeats during the German invasion came as a shock to the civilian population.[76] Lacking training for such a disaster, the civilian population panicked and retreated east, spreading chaos, lowering troop morale and making road transportation for Polish troops very difficult.[76]

France and the UK declared war on Germany on 3 September, but failed to provide any meaningful support. The German-French border saw only a few minor skirmishes, although the majority of German forces, including 85% of their armoured forces, were engaged in Poland. Despite some Polish successes in minor border battles, German technical, operational and numerical superiority forced the Polish armies to retreat from the borders towards Warsaw and Lwów. The Luftwaffe gained air superiority early in the campaign. By destroying communications, the Luftwaffe increased the pace of the advance which overran Polish airstrips and early warning sites, causing logistical problems for the Poles. Many Polish Air Force units ran low on supplies, 98 of their number withdrew into then-neutral Romania.[78] The Polish initial strength of 400 was reduced to 54 by 14 September and air opposition virtually ceased,[78] with the main Polish air bases destroyed in the first 48 hours of the war.[79]

Hitler watching German soldiers marching into Poland in September 1939.

Germany attacked from three directions on land. Günther von Kluge led 20 divisions that entered the Polish Corridor, and met a second force heading to Warsaw from East Prussia. Gerd von Rundstedt's 35 divisions attacked southern Poland.[79] By 3 September, when von Kluge in the north had reached the Vistula River (some 10 km (6.2 mi) from the German border at that time) and Georg von Küchler was approaching the Narew River, Walther von Reichenau's armor was already beyond the Warta river; two days later, his left wing was well to the rear of Łódź and his right wing at the town of Kielce. On 7 September the defenders of Warsaw had fallen back to a 48 km (30 mi) line paralleling the Vistula River, where they rallied against German tank thrusts. The defensive line ran between Płońsk and Pułtusk, northwest and northeast of Warsaw, respectively. The right wing of the Poles had been hammered back from Ciechanów about 40 km (25 mi) northwest of Pułtusk pivoting on Płońsk. At one stage in the struggle the Poles were driven from Pułtusk and the Germans threatened to turn the Polish flank and thrust on to the Vistula and Warsaw. Pułtusk, however, was regained in the face of withering German fire. Many German tanks were captured after a German attack pierced the line but the Polish defenders outflanked them.[80] By 8 September, one of Reichenau's armored corps—having advanced 225 km (140 mi) in the first week of the campaign—reached the outskirts of Warsaw. Light divisions on Reichenau's right were on the Vistula between Warsaw and the town of Sandomierz by 9 September while List—in the south—was on the San River north and south of the town of Przemyśl. At the same time, Guderian led his 3rd Army tanks across the Narew, attacking the line of the Bug River, already encircling Warsaw. All the German armies made progress in fulfilling their parts of the Fall Weiss plan. The Polish armies were splitting up into uncoordinated fragments, some of which were retreating while others were launching disjointed attacks on the nearest German columns.

Polish forces abandoned the regions of Pomerelia (the Polish Corridor), Greater Poland and Polish Upper Silesia in the first week. The Polish plan for border defence was proven a dismal failure. The German advance as a whole was not slowed. On 10 September, the Polish commander-in-chief—Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły—ordered a general retreat to the southeast, towards the so-called Romanian Bridgehead.[81] Meanwhile, the Germans were tightening their encirclement of the Polish forces west of the Vistula (in the Łódź area and, still farther west, around Poznań) and also penetrating deeply into eastern Poland. Warsaw—under heavy aerial bombardment since the first hours of the war—was attacked on 9 September and was put under siege on 13 September. Around that time, advanced German forces also reached the city of Lwów, a major metropolis in eastern Poland. 1,150 German aircraft bombed Warsaw on 24 September.

The Polish defensive plan called for a strategy of encirclement: they were to allow the Germans to advance in between two Polish Army groups in the line between Berlin and Warsaw-Lodz, at which point Armia Prusy would move in and repulse the German spearhead, trapping them. In order for this to happen, Armia Prusy needed to be fully mobilized by 3 September. However, Polish military planners failed to foresee the speed of the German advance and assumed that Armia Prusy would need to be fully mobilized by 16 September.[82]

The largest battle during this campaign—the Battle of Bzura—took place near the Bzura river west of Warsaw and lasted 9–19 September. Polish armies Poznań and Pomorze, retreating from the border area of the Polish Corridor, attacked the flank of the advancing German 8th Army, but the counterattack failed after initial success. After the defeat, Poland lost its ability to take the initiative and counterattack on a large scale. German air power was instrumental during the battle. The Luftwaffe's offensive broke what remained of Polish resistance in an "awesome demonstration of air power".[83] The Luftwaffe quickly destroyed the bridges across the Bzura River. Afterward, the Polish forces were trapped out in the open, and were attacked by wave after wave of Stukas, dropping 50 kg (110 lb) "light bombs" which caused huge numbers of casualties. The Polish anti-aircraft batteries ran out of ammunition and retreated to the forests, but were then "smoked out" by the Heinkel He 111 and Dornier Do 17s dropping 100 kg (220 lb) incendiaries. The Luftwaffe left the army with the task of mopping up survivors. The Stukageschwaders alone dropped 388 t (428 short tons) of bombs during this battle.[83]

By 12 September all of Poland west of the Vistula was conquered, except for isolated Warsaw.[79] The Polish government (of President Ignacy Mościcki) and the high command (of Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły) left Warsaw in the first days of the campaign and headed southeast, reaching Lublin on 6 September. From there, it moved on 9 September to Kremenez, and on 13 September to Zaleshiki on the Romanian border.[84] Rydz-Śmigły ordered the Polish forces to retreat in the same direction, behind the Vistula and San rivers, beginning the preparations for the defence of the Romanian Bridgehead area.[81]

From the beginning, the German government repeatedly asked Vyacheslav Molotov whether the Soviet Union would keep to its side of the partition bargain.[85][86] The Soviet forces were holding fast along their designated invasion points pending finalization of the five-month-long undeclared war with Japan in the Far East. On 15 September 1939, the Ambassadors Molotov and Shigenori Tōgō completed their agreement ending the conflict, and the Nomonhan cease-fire went into effect on 16 September 1939. Now cleared of any "second front" threat from the Japanese, Soviet premier Joseph Stalin ordered his forces into Poland on 17 September.[15] It was agreed that the USSR would relinquish its interest in the territories between the new border and Warsaw in exchange for inclusion of Lithuania in the Soviet "zone of interest".

By 17 September, the Polish defence was already broken and the only hope was to retreat and reorganize along the Romanian Bridgehead. However, these plans were rendered obsolete nearly overnight, when the over 800,000-strong Soviet Red Army entered and created the Belarusian and Ukrainianfronts after invading the eastern regions of Poland in violation of the Riga Peace Treaty, the Soviet-Polish Non-Aggression Pact, and other international treaties, both bilateral and multilateral.[Note 6] Soviet diplomacy had lied that they were "protecting the Ukrainian and Belarusian minorities of eastern Poland since the Polish government had abandoned the country and the Polish state ceased to exist".[88]

Polish border defence forces in the east—known as the Korpus Ochrony Pogranicza—consisted of about 25 battalions. Edward Rydz-Śmigły ordered them to fall back and not engage the Soviets.[81] This, however, did not prevent some clashes and small battles, such as the Battle of Grodno, as soldiers and local population attempted to defend the city. The Soviets executed numerous Polish officers, including prisoners of war like General Józef Olszyna-Wilczyński.[89][90] The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists rose against the Poles, and communist partisans organized local revolts, robbing and killing civilians.[91] Those movements were quickly disciplined by the NKVD. The Soviet invasion was one of the decisive factors that convinced the Polish government that the war in Poland was lost.[92] Before the Soviet attack from the east, the Polish military's fall-back plan had called for long-term defence against Germany in the south-eastern part of Poland, while awaiting relief from a Western Allies attack on Germany's western border.[92] However, the Polish government refused to surrender or negotiate a peace with Germany. Instead, it ordered all units to evacuate Poland and reorganize in France.

Meanwhile, Polish forces tried to move towards the Romanian Bridgehead area, still actively resisting the German invasion. From 17–20 September, Polish armies Kraków and Lublin were crippled at the Battle of Tomaszów Lubelski, the second-largest battle of the campaign. The city of Lwów capitulated on 22 September because of Soviet intervention; the city had been attacked by the Germans over a week earlier, and in the middle of the siege, the German troops handed operations over to their Soviet allies.[93] Despite a series of intensifying German attacks, Warsaw—defended by quickly reorganized retreating units, civilian volunteers and militia—held out until 28 September. The Modlin Fortress north of Warsaw capitulated on 29 September after an intense 16-day battle. Some isolated Polish garrisons managed to hold their positions long after being surrounded by German forces. Westerplatte enclave's tiny garrison capitulated on 7 September and the Oksywie garrison held until 19 September; Hel Fortified Areawas defended until 2 October.[94] In the last week of September, Hitler made a speech in the city of Danzig in which he said:

Meantime, Russia felt moved, on its part, to march in for the protection of the interests of the White Russian and Ukrainian people in Poland. We realize now that in England and France this German and Russian co-operation is considered a terrible crime. An Englishman even wrote that it is perfidious – well, the English ought to know. I believe England thinks this co-operation perfidious because the co-operation of democratic England with bolshevist Russia failed, while National Socialist Germany's attempt with Soviet Russia succeeded.

A girl cries over the body of her 14-year-old sister who was strafed by the Luftwaffe

Hundreds of thousands of Polish civilians were killed during the September invasion of Poland and millions more were killed in the following years of German and Soviet occupation. The Polish Campaign was the first action by Adolf Hitler in his attempt to create Lebensraum (living space) for Germans. Nazi propaganda was one of the factors behind the German brutality directed at civilians which had worked relentlessly to convince the German people into believing that the Jews and Slavs were Untermenschen (subhumans).[97][98]

Starting from the first day of invasion, the German air force (the Luftwaffe) attacked civilian targets and columns of refugees along the roads to terrorize the Polish people, disrupt communications, and target Polish morale. The Luftwaffe killed 6,000–7,000 Polish civilians during the bombing of Warsaw.[99]

During Operation Tannenberg, an ethnic cleansing campaign organized by multiple elements of the German government, tens of thousands of Polish civilians were shot at 760 mass execution sites by the Einsatzgruppen.

Altogether, the civilian losses of Polish population amounted to about 150,000–200,000.[103] Roughly 1,250 German civilians were also killed during the invasion. (An additional 2,000 died fighting Polish troops as members of ethnic German militia forces such as the Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz, which constituted a fifth column during the invasion.)[104]

Poland's defeat was the inevitable outcome of the Warsaw government's illusions about the actions its allies would take, as well as of its over-estimation of the Polish Army's ability to offer lengthy resistance.[105]

Even though water barriers separated most of the spheres of interest, the Soviet and German troops met on numerous occasions. The most remarkable event of this kind occurred at Brest-Litovsk on 22 September. The German 19th Panzer Corps—commanded by General Heinz Guderian—had occupied the city, which lay within the Soviet sphere of interest. When the Soviet 29th Tank Brigade (commanded by Semyon Krivoshein) approached, the commanders agreed that the German troops would withdraw and the Soviet troops would enter the city, saluting each other.[108] At Brest-Litovsk, Soviet and German commanders held a joint victory parade before German forces withdrew westward behind a new demarcation line.[17][109] Just three days earlier, however, the parties had a more hostile encounter near Lwow (Lviv, Lemberg), when the German 137th Gebirgsjägerregimenter (mountain infantry regiment) attacked a reconnaissance detachment of the Soviet 24th Tank Brigade; after a few casualties on both sides, the parties turned to negotiations. The German troops left the area, and the Red Army troops entered Lviv on 22 September.

The Molotov–Ribbentrop pact and the invasion of Poland marked the beginning of a period during which the government of the Soviet Union increasingly tried to convince itself that the actions of Germany were reasonable, and were not developments to be worried about, despite evidence to the contrary.[110] On 7 September 1939, just a few days after France and Britain joined the war against Germany], Stalin explained to a colleague that the war was to the advantage of the Soviet Union, as follows:[111]

A war is on between two groups of capitalist countries ... for the redivision of the world, for the domination of the world! We see nothing wrong in their having a good hard fight and weakening each other ... Hitler, without understanding it or desiring it, is shaking and undermining the capitalist system ... We can manoeuvre, pit one side against the other to set them fighting with each other as fiercely as possible ... The annihilation of Poland would mean one fewer bourgeois fascist state to contend with! What would be the harm if as a result of the rout of Poland we were to extend the socialist system onto new territories and populations?[111]

Polish troops withdrawn to Hungary in September 1939

About 65,000 Polish troops were killed in the fighting, with 420,000 others being captured by the Germans and 240,000 more by the Soviets (for a total of 660,000 prisoners). Up to 120,000 Polish troops escaped to neutralRomania (through the Romanian Bridgehead and Hungary), and another 20,000 to Latvia and Lithuania, with the majority eventually making their way to France or Britain. Most of the Polish Navy succeeded in evacuating to Britain as well. German personnel losses were less than their enemies (c. 16,000 killed).

German soldiers removing Polish government insignia

None of the parties to the conflict—Germany, the Western Allies or the Soviet Union—expected that the German invasion of Poland would lead to a war that would surpass World War I in its scale and cost. It would be months before Hitler would see the futility of his peace negotiation attempts with the United Kingdom and France, but the culmination of combined European and Pacific conflicts would result in what was truly a "world war". Thus, what was not seen by most politicians and generals in 1939 is clear from the historical perspective: The Polish September Campaign marked the beginning of a pan-European war, which combined with the Japanese invasion of China in 1937 and the Pacific War in 1941 to form the global conflict known as World War II.

The invasion of Poland led Britain and France to declare war on Germany on 3 September. However, they did little to affect the outcome of the September Campaign. No declaration of war was issued by Britain and France against the Soviet Union. This lack of direct help led many Poles to believe that they had been betrayed by their Western allies.

On 23 May 1939, Hitler explained to his officers that the object of the aggression was not Danzig, but the need to obtain German Lebensraum and details of this concept would be later formulated in the infamous Generalplan Ost.[112][113] The invasion decimated urban residential areas, civilians soon became indistinguishable from combatants, and the forthcoming German occupation (both on the annexed territories and in the General Government) was one of the most brutal episodes of World War II, resulting in between 5.47 million and 5.67 million Polish deaths[114] (about 20% of the country's total population, and over 90% of its Jewish minority)—including the mass murder of 3 million Polish citizens (mainly Jews as part of the final solution) in extermination camps like Auschwitz, in concentration camps, and in numerous ad hoc massacres, where civilians were rounded up, taken to a nearby forest, machine-gunned, and then buried, whether they were dead or not.[citation needed]

Since October 1939, the Polish army that could escape imprisonment from the Soviets or Nazis were mainly heading for British and French territories. These places were considered safe, because of the pre-war alliance between Great-Britain, France and Poland. Not only did the government escape, but also the national gold supply was evacuated via Romania and brought to the West, notably London and Ottawa.[116][117] The approximately 75 tonnes (83 short tons) of gold was considered sufficient to field an army for the duration of the war.[118]

From Lemberg to Bordeaux ('Von Lemberg bis Bordeaux'), written by Leo Leixner, a journalist and war correspondent, is a first-hand account of the battles that led to the fall of Poland, the low countries, and France. It includes a rare eye-witness description of the Battle of Węgierska Górka. In August 1939, Leixner joined the Wehrmacht as a war reporter, was promoted to sergeant, and in 1941 published his recollections. The book was originally issued by Franz Eher Nachfolger, the central publishing house of the Nazi Party.[119]

The Polish Army did not fight German tanks with horse-mounted cavalry wielding lances and swords. In 1939, only 10% of the Polish army was made up of cavalry units.[120] Polish cavalry never charged German tanks or entrenched infantry or artillery, but usually acted as mobile infantry (like dragoons) and reconnaissance units, and executed cavalry charges only in rare situations against foot soldiers. Other armies (including German and Soviet) also fielded and extensively used elite horse cavalry units at that time. Polish cavalry consisted of eleven brigades, equipped with "UR" anti-tank rifles and light artillery such as the highly effective Bofors 37 mm anti-tank gun. The myth originated from war correspondents' reports similar to that of the Battle of Krojanty, where a Polish cavalry brigade was fired upon in ambush by hidden armored vehicles, after it had mounted a successful sabre-charge against German infantry. There were also been cases when Polish cavalry dashing between tanks trying to break out of encirclement gave an impression of an attack.[Note 7][121]

The Polish Air Force was not destroyed on the ground in the first days of the war. Though numerically inferior, it had been redeployed from major air bases to small camouflaged airfields shortly before the war. Only some trainers and auxiliary aircraft were destroyed on the ground. The Polish Air Force, despite being significantly outnumbered and with its fighters outmatched by more advanced German fighters, remained active until the second week of the campaign, inflicting significant damage on the Luftwaffe.[122] The Luftwaffe lost 285 aircraft to all operational causes, with 279 more damaged, and the Poles lost 333 aircraft.[123]

Another question concerns whether Poland inflicted any significant losses on the German forces and whether it surrendered too quickly. In the first few days, Germany sustained very heavy losses: Poland cost the Germans 993 tanks and armored vehicles as campaign losses of which 300 tanks were never recovered,[124][125] thousands of soldiers, and 25% of its air strength.[126] As for duration, the September Campaign lasted about a week and a half less than the Battle of France in 1940 even though the Anglo-French forces were much closer to parity with the Germans in numerical strength and equipment and were supported by Maginot line.[Note 8] Furthermore, the Polish Army was preparing the Romanian Bridgehead, which would have prolonged Polish defense, but the plan was invalidated by the Soviet invasion of Poland on 17 September 1939.[127] Poland also never officially surrendered to the Germans. Under German occupation, there was continued resistance by forces such as the Armia Krajowa, Henryk Dobrzański's guerillas, and the Leśni ("forest partisans").

Polish soldiers with anti-aircraft artillery near the Warsaw Central Station in the first days of September 1939.

It is often assumed that Blitzkrieg is the strategy that Germany first used in Poland. The ideas of Blitzkrieg and mobile warfare had already been used in Spain, China and Siberia. Many early post-war histories, such as Barrie Pitt's in The Second World War (BPC Publishing 1966), attribute German victory to "enormous development in military technique which occurred between 1918 and 1940", and cite that "Germany, who translated (British inter-war) theories into action... called the result Blitzkrieg". That idea has been repudiated by some authors. Matthew Cooper writes:

Throughout the Polish Campaign, the employment of the mechanized units revealed the idea that they were intended solely to ease the advance and to support the activities of the infantry.... Thus, any strategic exploitation of the armoured idea was still-born. The paralysis of command and the breakdown of morale were not made the ultimate aim of the ... German ground and air forces, and were only incidental by-products of the traditional manoeuvers of rapid encirclement and of the supporting activities of the flying artillery of the Luftwaffe, both of which had as their purpose the physical destruction of the enemy troops. Such was the Vernichtungsgedanke of the Polish campaign. — Cooper [128]

...left much to be desired.… Fear of enemy action against the flanks of the advance, fear which was to prove so disastrous to German prospects in the west in 1940 and in the Soviet Union in 1941, was present from the beginning of the war. — Cooper [53]

...there is considerable justice in Matthew Cooper's assertion that the panzer divisions were not given the kind of strategic mission that was to characterize authentic armoured blitzkrieg, and were almost always closely subordinated to the various mass infantry armies. — Ellis [129] (emphasis in original)

Zaloga and Madej, in The Polish Campaign 1939, also address the subject of mythical interpretations of Blitzkrieg and the importance of other arms in the campaign. Western accounts of the September campaign have stressed the shock value of the panzers and Stuka attacks, they have

...tended to underestimate the punishing effect of German artillery on Polish units. Mobile and available in significant quantity, artillery shattered as many units as any other branch of the Wehrmacht. — Zaloga and Madej [130]

^Various sources contradict each other so the figures quoted above should only be taken as a rough indication of the strength estimate. The most common range differences and their brackets are: German personnel 1,490,900 (official figure of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs) – or 1,800,000. Polish tanks: 100–880, 100 is the number of modern tanks, while the 880 number includes older tanks from the World War I era and tankettes.[6][7]

^The discrepancy in German casualties can be attributed to the fact that some German statistics still listed soldiers as missing decades after the war. Today the most common and accepted numbers are: 8,082 to 16,343 KIA, 320 to 5,029 MIA, 27,280 to 34,136 WIA.[8] For comparison, in his 1939 speech following the Polish Campaign Adolf Hitler presented these German figures: 10,576 KIA, 30,222 WIA, and 3,400 MIA.[9] According to early Allied estimates, including those of the Polish government-in-exile, the number of German KIA casualties was 90,000 and WIA casualties was 200,000[9][10]
Equipment losses are given as 832 German tanks [11] of with approximately 236[11] to 341 as irrecoverable losses and approximately 319 other armored vehicles as irrecoverable losses (including 165 Panzerspähwagen – of them 101 as irrecoverable losses)[11] 522–561 German planes (including 246–285 destroyed and 276 damaged), 1 German minelayer (M-85) and 1 German torpedo ship ("Tiger")

^Various sources contradict each other so the figures quoted above should only be taken as a rough indication of losses. The most common range brackets for casualties are: Poland: 63,000 to 66,300 KIA, 134,000 WIA.[8] The often cited figure of 420,000 Polish prisoners of war represents only those captured by the Germans, as Soviets captured about 250,000 Polish POWs themselves, making the total number of Polish POWs about 660,000–690,000. In terms of equipment the Polish Navy lost 1 destroyer (ORP Wicher), 1 minelayer (ORP Gryf) and several support craft. Equipment loses included 132 Polish tanks and armored cars 327 Polish planes (118 fighters)[11]

^Telegram: The German Ambassador in the Soviet Union, (Schulenburg) to the German Foreign Office. Moscow, 10 September 1939 – 9:40 p. m. and Telegram 2: he German Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Schulenburg) to the German Foreign Office. Moscow, 16 September 1939. Source: The Avalon Project at Yale Law School. Last. Retrieved 14 November 2006

Cooper, Matthew (1978). The German Army 1939–1945: Its Political and Military Failure. New York: Stein and Day. ISBN0-8128-2468-7.

Corum, James S. (2013). "The Luftwaffe's Campaigns in Poland and the West 1939–1940: A Case Study of handling Innovation in Wartime". Security and Defence Quarterly (1): 158–189. doi:10.5604/23008741.1191778 (inactive 2017-01-21).

Majer, Diemut; et al. (2003). Non-Germans under the Third Reich: The Nazi Judicial and Administrative System in Germany and Occupied Eastern Europe, with Special Regard to Occupied Poland, 1939–1945. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN0-8018-6493-3.

1.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan

2.
Luftwaffe
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The Luftwaffe was the aerial warfare branch of the combined German Wehrmacht military forces during World War II. During the interwar period, German pilots were trained secretly in violation of the treaty at Lipetsk Air Base, with the rise of the Nazi Party and the repudiation of the Versailles Treaty, the Luftwaffe was officially established on 26 February 1935. The Condor Legion, a Luftwaffe detachment sent to aid Nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War, provided the force with a testing ground for new doctrines. By the summer of 1939, the Luftwaffe had twenty-eight Geschwaders, during World War II, German pilots claimed roughly 70,000 aerial victories, while over 75,000 Luftwaffe aircraft were destroyed or significantly damaged. Of these, nearly 40,000 were lost entirely, the Luftwaffe proved instrumental in the German victories across Poland and Western Europe in 1939 and 1940. From 1942, Allied bombing campaigns gradually destroyed the Luftwaffes fighter arm, in addition to its service in the West, the Luftwaffe operated over the Soviet Union, North Africa and Southern Europe. In January 1945, during the stages of the Battle of the Bulge, the Luftwaffe made a last-ditch effort to win air superiority. After the defeat of Germany, the Luftwaffe was disbanded in 1946, the Luftwaffe had only two commanders-in-chief throughout its history, Hermann Göring and later Generalfeldmarschall Robert Ritter von Greim. Throughout the war, the force was responsible for war crimes, one of the forerunners of the Luftwaffe, the Imperial German Army Air Service, was founded in 1910 with the name Die Fliegertruppen des deutschen Kaiserreiches, most often shortened to Fliegertruppe. It was renamed Luftstreitkräfte on 8 October 1916, after the defeat of Germany, the service was dissolved on 8 May 1920 under the conditions of the Treaty of Versailles, which also mandated the destruction of all German military aircraft. Since the Treaty of Versailles forbade Germany to have an air force, to train its pilots on the latest combat aircraft, Germany solicited the help of its future enemy, the Soviet Union, which was also isolated in Europe. This base was known as 4th squadron of the 40th wing of the Red Army. Hundreds of Luftwaffe pilots and technical personnel visited, studied and were trained at Soviet air force schools in locations in Central Russia. The first steps towards the Luftwaffes formation were undertaken just months after Adolf Hitler came to power, in April 1933 the Reichsluftfahrtministerium was established. Görings control over all aspects of aviation became absolute, on 25 March 1933 the Deutschen Luftsportverband absorbed all private and national organizations, while retaining its sports title. On 15 May 1933, all military organizations in the RLM were merged, forming the Luftwaffe. The |Nationalsozialistisches Fliegerkorps was formed in 1937 to give pre-military flying training to male youths, military-age members of the NSFK were drafted to the Luftwaffe. As all such prior NSFK members were also Nazi Party members, the absence of Göring in planning and production matters was fortunate

3.
SMS Schleswig-Holstein
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SMS Schleswig-Holstein was the last of the five Deutschland-class battleships built by the German Kaiserliche Marine. The ship, named for the province of Schleswig-Holstein, was laid down in the Germaniawerft dockyard in Kiel in August 1905 and commissioned into the fleet nearly three years later. The ships of her class were already outdated by the time entered service, being inferior in size, armor, firepower. Schleswig-Holstein fought in both World Wars, during World War I, she saw front-line service in the II Battle Squadron of the High Seas Fleet, culminating in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May –1 June 1916. Schleswig-Holstein saw action during the engagement, and was hit by one large-caliber shell, after the battle, Schleswig-Holstein was relegated to guard duty in the mouth of the Elbe River before being decommissioned in late 1917. As one of the few battleships permitted for Germany by the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, in 1935, the old battleship was converted into a training ship for naval cadets. Schleswig-Holstein fired the first shots of World War II when she bombarded the Polish base at Danzigs Westerplatte in the morning hours of 1 September 1939. The ship was used as a vessel for the majority of the war. Schleswig-Holstein was subsequently salvaged and then beached for use by the Soviet Navy as a target, as of 1990, the ships bell was on display in the Bundeswehr Military History Museum in Dresden. Schleswig-Holstein was laid down on 18 August 1905 at the Germaniawerft dockyard in Kiel and she was launched on 17 December 1906, the last pre-dreadnought battleship of the German navy. At Schleswig-Holsteins launching ceremony, she was christened by Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein, ernst Gunther, the Duke of Schleswig-Holstein, gave the commissioning speech. Schleswig-Holstein had a length of 127.60 m, a beam of 22.20 m, and she displaced 13,200 metric tons normally and up to 14,218 metric tons at combat loading. She was equipped with three triple expansion engines and twelve coal-fired water-tube boilers that produced a rated 16,767 indicated horsepower, in addition to being the fastest ship of her class, Schleswig-Holstein was the second-most fuel efficient. At a cruising speed of 10 knots, she could steam for 5,720 nautical miles and she had a standard crew of 35 officers and 708 enlisted men. The ships primary armament consisted of four 28 cm SK L/40 guns in two turrets, one turret was placed forward and the other aft. She was also equipped with fourteen 17 cm SK L/40 guns mounted in casemates, the ship was also armed with six 45 cm torpedo tubes, all below the waterline. One was in the bow, one in the stern, and her armored belt was 240 mm thick amidships, and she had a 40 mm thick armored deck. The main battery turrets had 280 mm thick sides, upon completion, Schleswig-Holstein was commissioned for sea trials on 6 July 1908

4.
Westerplatte
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Westerplatte is a peninsula in Gdańsk, Poland, located on the Baltic Sea coast mouth of the Dead Vistula, in the Gdańsk harbour channel. From 1926 to 1939 it was the location of a Polish Military Transit Depot, the resort was established on the Westerplatte peninsula around 1830 which had a beach, a forested park, an ocean-side bath complex and health spa facilities. In 1925 the Council of the League of Nations allowed Poland to keep 88 soldiers on Westerplatte and they were armed with one 75 mm gun, two 37 mm Bofors antitank guns, four mortars and a number of medium machine guns. There were no fortifications, but several reinforced buildings and guardhouses equipped with heavy weapons hidden in the peninsulas forest. The Polish garrison was separated from Free City of Danzig by the harbor channel, in case of war, the defenders were supposed to withstand a sustained attack for 12 hours after which a relief from the main units of the Polish Army were to arrive. The Polish garrisons commanding officer was Major Henryk Sucharski, the officer was Captain Franciszek Dąbrowski. This was followed by an attack by Oblt, wilhelm Henningsen’s storm unit from the Schleswig-Holstein and the Marinestosstruppkompanie. Another two assaults that day were repelled as well, with the Germans suffering unexpectedly high losses, over the coming days, the Germans repeatedly bombarded Westerplatte with naval artillery and heavy field artillery along with dive-bombing raids by Junkers Ju 87 Stukas. Repeated attacks by 570 German soldiers were repelled by the 180 Polish soldiers for seven days, Major Henryk Sucharski had been informed that no help from the Polish Army would come. Cut off, with no reinforcements or chance of resupply, he continued his defense, keeping the main German force stalled at Westerplatte, on 7 September the Major decided to surrender, due to lack of ammunition and supplies. As a sign of honor for the soldiers of Westerplatte, German commander, Gen. Eberhardt, the ruins of the defenders barracks and guardhouses are still there. After the war, one of the guardhouses was converted into a museum, two 280mm shells from the Schleswig-Holstein prop up its entrance. A Monument of the Coast Defenders was unveiled in 1966, karol Szwedowski The German invasion of Poland The Polish Army The German Wehrmacht Stanisława Górnikiewicz-Kurowska. Dziennik działań bojowych pancernika Schleswig-Holstein 8.09. -2.10.1939 r, Gdańsk, Muzeum Historii Miasta Gdańska, Wydaw. Westerplatczycy, losy obrońców Wojskowej Składnicy Tranzytowej, a Song of the Soldiers of Westerplatte westerplatte. pl/ Map of events occurring in Westerplatte Huge article about battle of Westerplatte

5.
Wehrmacht
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The Wehrmacht was the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1946. It consisted of the Heer, the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe, after the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, one of Adolf Hitler’s most overt and audacious moves was to establish the Wehrmacht, a modern armed forces fully capable of offensive use. In December 1941, Hitler designated himself as commander-in-chief of the Wehrmacht, the Wehrmacht formed the heart of Germany’s politico-military power. In the early part of World War II, Hitlers generals employed the Wehrmacht through innovative combined arms tactics to devastating effect in what was called a Blitzkrieg, the Wehrmachts new military structure, unique combat techniques, newly developed weapons, and unprecedented speed and brutality crushed their opponents. Closely cooperating with the SS, the German armed forces committed war crimes and atrocities. By the time the war ended in Europe in May 1945, only a few of the Wehrmacht’s upper leadership were tried for war crimes, despite evidence suggesting that more were involved in illegal actions. The German term Wehrmacht generically describes any nations armed forces, for example, the Frankfurt Constitution of 1848 designated all German military forces as the German Wehrmacht, consisting of the Seemacht and the Landmacht. In 1919, the term Wehrmacht also appears in Article 47 of the Weimar Constitution, establishing that, from 1919, Germanys national defense force was known as the Reichswehr, a name that was dropped in favor of Wehrmacht on 21 May 1935. In January 1919, after World War I ended with the signing of the armistice of 11 November 1918, in March 1919, the national assembly passed a law founding a 420, 000-strong preliminary army, the Vorläufige Reichswehr. The terms of the Treaty of Versailles were announced in May, the army was limited to one hundred thousand men with an additional fifteen thousand in the navy. The fleet was to consist of at most six battleships, six cruisers, submarines, tanks and heavy artillery were forbidden and the air-force was dissolved. A new post-war military, the Reichswehr, was established on 23 March 1921, General conscription was abolished under another mandate of the Versailles treaty. The Reichswehr was limited to 115,000 men, and thus the armed forces, under the leadership of Hans von Seeckt, though Seeckt retired in 1926, the army that went to war in 1939 was largely his creation. Germany was forbidden to have an air-force by the Versailles treaty, nonetheless and these officers saw the role of an air-force as winning air-superiority, tactical and strategic bombing and providing ground support. That the Luftwaffe did not develop a strategic bombing force in the 1930s was not due to a lack of interest, but because of economic limitations. The leadership of the Navy led by Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, officers who believed in submarine warfare led by Admiral Karl Dönitz were in a minority before 1939. By 1922, Germany had begun covertly circumventing the conditions of the Versailles Treaty, a secret collaboration with the Soviet Union began after the treaty of Rapallo. Major-General Otto Hasse traveled to Moscow in 1923 to further negotiate the terms, Germany helped the Soviet Union with industrialization and Soviet officers were to be trained in Germany

6.
Bombing of Warsaw in World War II
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The Bombing of Warsaw in World War II refers to the bombing campaign of Warsaw by the German Luftwaffe during the siege of Warsaw in the Invasion of Poland in 1939. It also may refer to German bombing raids during the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, during the course of the war approximately 84% of the city was destroyed due to German and Soviet mass bombings, heavy artillery fire and a planned demolition campaign. In 1939, the Luftwafe opened the German attack on Poland with operation Wasserkante, however, heavy losses in Polish fighter aircraft meant that by 6 September the air defense of Warsaw was in the hands of the 40 mm and 75 mm anti-aircraft guns of the Warsaw Defense Command. On 13 September Luftwaffe level and dive bombers caused widespread fires, further resistance was followed by propaganda leaflet drops. The center of Warsaw was badly damaged, approximately 1,150 sorties were flown by a wide variety of aircraft, including obsolescent Junkers Ju-52/3m bombers, which dropped 13 percent of the incendiary bombs dropped on the day. Only two Ju-52 bombers were lost, although commonly portrayed as being absolutely decisive, the Black Monday air attack was a mixed success. While the bombing lowered Polish morale, it did not cause the Polish surrender, smoke from fires and large amounts of dust obscured targets and greatly reduced accuracy. The tonnage dropped combined with only approximate delivery on target and the short duration does not begin to approximate the intensity of attacks major European cities were subsequently to suffer. However, on 26 September three key forts in the city defenses were captured, and the Polish garrison offered its surrender - on 27 September German troops entered the city. By estimates around 20,000 to 25,000 civilians were killed,40 percent of the buildings in the city were damaged and 10 percent of the buildings destroyed. The September 25 raid was an example of bombing, with the aim of breaking Polish morale. However, according to the laws of war in 1939, Warsaw was a military target. Air warfare of World War II Siege of Warsaw Planned destruction of Warsaw Corum, the Luftwaffes Campaigns in Poland and the West 1939-1940, A Case Study of Handling Innovation in Wartime. Electronic Encyclopedia of Civil Defense - Bombing of Warsaw

7.
Second Polish Republic
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The Second Polish Republic, also known as the Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland, refers to the country of Poland between the First and Second World Wars. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland and it had access to the Baltic Sea via a short strip of coastline either side of the city of Gdynia. Between March and August 1939, Poland also shared a border with the then-Hungarian governorate of Subcarpathia, the Second Republic was significantly different in territory to the current Polish state. It included substantially more territory in the east and less in the west, the Second Republics land area was 388,634 km2, making it, in October 1938, the sixth largest country in Europe. After the annexation of Zaolzie, this grew to 389,720 km2, according to the 1921 census, the number of inhabitants was 27.2 million. By 1939, just before the outbreak of World War II, almost a third of population came from minority groups,13. 9% Ukrainians, 10% Jews,3. 1% Belarusians,2. 3% Germans and 3. 4% Czechs, Lithuanians and Russians. At the same time, a significant number of ethnic Poles lived outside the country borders, Poland maintained a slow but steady level of economic development. By 1939, the Republic had become one of Europes major powers, the victorious Allies of World War I confirmed the rebirth of Poland in the Treaty of Versailles of June 1919. It was one of the stories of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. Poland solidified its independence in a series of wars fought by the newly formed Polish Army from 1918 to 1921. The extent of the half of the interwar territory of Poland was settled diplomatically in 1922. In the course of World War I, Germany gradually gained overall dominance on the Eastern Front as the Imperial Russian Army fell back, German and Austro-Hungarian armies seized the Russian-ruled part of what became Poland. In a failed attempt to resolve the Polish question as quickly as possible, Berlin set up a German puppet state on 5 November 1916, with a governing Provisional Council of State, the Council administered the country under German auspices, pending the election of a king. A month before Germany surrendered on 11 November 1918 and the war ended, the Regency Council had dissolved the Council of State, with the notable exception of the Marxist-oriented Social Democratic Party of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania, most Polish political parties supported this move. On 23 October the Regency Council appointed a new government under Józef Świeżyński, in 1918–1919, over 100 workers councils sprang up on Polish territories, on 5 November 1918, in Lublin, the first Soviet of Delegates was established. On 6 November socialists proclaimed the Republic of Tarnobrzeg at Tarnobrzeg in Austrian Galicia, the same day the Socialist, Ignacy Daszyński, set up a Provisional Peoples Government of the Republic of Poland in Lublin. On Sunday,10 November at 7 a. m, Józef Piłsudski, newly freed from 16 months in a German prison in Magdeburg, returned by train to Warsaw. Piłsudski, together with Colonel Kazimierz Sosnkowski, was greeted at Warsaws railway station by Regent Zdzisław Lubomirski, next day, due to his popularity and support from most political parties, the Regency Council appointed Piłsudski as Commander in Chief of the Polish Armed Forces

8.
Wschowa
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Wschowa is a town in the Lubusz Voivodeship in Poland with 14,607 inhabitants. It is the capital of Wschowa County, Wschowa was originally a border fortress in a region disputed by the Polish dukes of Silesia and Greater Poland. After German colonists had established a settlement nearby, it received Magdeburg rights around 1250, the Old Polish name Veschow was first mentioned in 1248, while the Middle High German name Frowenstat Civitas first appeared in 1290. After the Silesian Piast dukes had gradually accepted Bohemian suzerainty, King Casimir III the Great in 1343 finally conquered it for Poland, the ziemia Wschowa then was incorporated into the Greater Polish Poznań Voivodeship of the Polish Crown. Wschowa and its Latin school was one of the centres of the Protestant Reformation in Poland, the Battle of Fraustadt occurred on February 3,1706 during the Great Northern War, when Swedish forces defeated a joint army of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Saxony and Russia. Jakob Walter, a Napoleonic soldier claimed to have passed through the town in 1806 and he claims the town was used as a garrison and had 99 windmills. A part of the Grand Duchy of Posen from 1815 on and it became a district center in the Province of Silesia till 1941, from 1941 to 1945 in the Province of Lower Silesia. Fraustadt was one of the few areas within Germany attacked by the Polish military during the Invasion of Poland in 1939, for a few hours its neighboring town of Geyersdorf was the first German town to be occupied by enemy forces in the war. Fraustadt was occupied by Red Army on 1 February 1945, since 1945 the area as a result of the Potsdam Conference belongs to Poland. The region was cleansed, the native German populace was expelled and replaced by Poles. Initially the town was part of Okreg III between 1945 and 1946, laterly a county center in Poznan Voivodeship between 1946 and 1950 and later in Zielona Gora Voivodeship between 1950 and 1975. It was finally a center in Leszno Voivodeship between 1975 and 1999 before creation of Lubusz province. It became again a center after 24 years. Wschowa is twinned with, Šalčininkai, Lithuania Fraustadt on Germania map of 1600 Official town website Jewish Community in Wschowa on Virtual Shtetl

9.
Free City of Danzig
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The Free City of Danzig was a semi-autonomous city-state that existed between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig and nearly 200 towns in the surrounding areas. It was created on 15 November 1920 in accordance with the terms of Article 100 of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles after the end of World War I. The Free City included the city of Danzig and other towns, villages. As the Treaty stated, the region was to remain separated from post-World War I Germany and from the independent nation of the Second Polish Republic. The Free City was under League of Nations protection and put into a customs union with Poland. Poland was given rights to develop and maintain transportation, communication. The Free City was created in order to give Poland access to a well-sized seaport, while the citys population was majority-German, it had a significant ethnic Polish minority as well. The German population deeply resented being separated from Germany, and persecuted the Polish minority and this was especially true after the Nazi Party gained political control in 1935–36. Since Poland still was not in control of the seaport, especially regarding military equipment. In 1933, the government was taken over by the local Nazi Party. Due to anti-Semitic persecution and oppression, many Jews fled, after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, the Nazis abolished the Free City and incorporated the area into the newly formed Reichsgau of Danzig-West Prussia. The Nazis classified the Poles and Jews living in the city as subhumans, subjecting them to discrimination, forced labor, many were sent to death at Nazi concentration camps, including nearby Stutthof. During the citys conquest by the Soviet Army in the months of 1945. After the war, many surviving Germans were expelled to West or East Germany as members of the pre-war Polish ethnic minority started returning, due to these events, Gdańsk suffered severe underpopulation and did not recover until the late 1950s. The city subsequently became part of Poland as a consequence of the Potsdam Agreement, Danzig had an early history of independence. It was a player in the Prussian Confederation directed against the Teutonic Monastic State of Prussia. The Confederation stipulated with the Polish king, Casimir IV Jagiellon, in contrast, Ducal Prussia remained a Polish fief. Danzig and other such as Elbing and Thorn financed most of the warfare

10.
Nazi Germany
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Nazi Germany is the common English name for the period in German history from 1933 to 1945, when Germany was governed by a dictatorship under the control of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Under Hitlers rule, Germany was transformed into a fascist state in which the Nazi Party took totalitarian control over all aspects of life. The official name of the state was Deutsches Reich from 1933 to 1943, the period is also known under the names the Third Reich and the National Socialist Period. The Nazi regime came to an end after the Allied Powers defeated Germany in May 1945, Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany by the President of the Weimar Republic Paul von Hindenburg on 30 January 1933. The Nazi Party then began to eliminate all opposition and consolidate its power. Hindenburg died on 2 August 1934, and Hitler became dictator of Germany by merging the powers and offices of the Chancellery, a national referendum held 19 August 1934 confirmed Hitler as sole Führer of Germany. All power was centralised in Hitlers person, and his word became above all laws, the government was not a coordinated, co-operating body, but a collection of factions struggling for power and Hitlers favour. In the midst of the Great Depression, the Nazis restored economic stability and ended mass unemployment using heavy military spending, extensive public works were undertaken, including the construction of Autobahnen. The return to economic stability boosted the regimes popularity, racism, especially antisemitism, was a central feature of the regime. The Germanic peoples were considered by the Nazis to be the purest branch of the Aryan race, millions of Jews and other peoples deemed undesirable by the state were murdered in the Holocaust. Opposition to Hitlers rule was ruthlessly suppressed, members of the liberal, socialist, and communist opposition were killed, imprisoned, or exiled. The Christian churches were also oppressed, with many leaders imprisoned, education focused on racial biology, population policy, and fitness for military service. Career and educational opportunities for women were curtailed, recreation and tourism were organised via the Strength Through Joy program, and the 1936 Summer Olympics showcased the Third Reich on the international stage. Propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels made effective use of film, mass rallies, the government controlled artistic expression, promoting specific art forms and banning or discouraging others. Beginning in the late 1930s, Nazi Germany made increasingly aggressive territorial demands and it seized Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938 and 1939. Hitler made a pact with Joseph Stalin and invaded Poland in September 1939. In alliance with Italy and smaller Axis powers, Germany conquered most of Europe by 1940, reichskommissariats took control of conquered areas, and a German administration was established in what was left of Poland. Jews and others deemed undesirable were imprisoned, murdered in Nazi concentration camps and extermination camps, following the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the tide gradually turned against the Nazis, who suffered major military defeats in 1943

11.
Slovak invasion of Poland (1939)
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The Slovak invasion of Poland occurred during Germanys invasion of Poland in September 1939. The recently created Slovak Republic joined the attack, and the Slovak Field Army Bernolák contributed over 50,000 soldiers in three divisions. As the main body of the Polish forces were engaged with the German armies farther north of the southern border, march 14,1939 saw the Slovak State established as a client state of Germany within the area of Slovakia. Prior to this, on November 2,1938, a part of Slovakia containing a substantial Hungarian population was taken by the Hungarian Army as a result of the First Vienna Award of November 2,1938. Small parts of disputed areas with mixed Polish and Slovak inhabitants belonged to Germany. The official political pretext for the Slovak participation in the Polish Campaign was a disagreement over a disputed area on the Poland-Slovakia border. Poland had appropriated this area on December 1,1938, in the aftermath of the Munich Agreement of September 1938, in addition, some Polish politicians supported Hungary in their effort to include into their state parts inhabited mostly by Hungarians. During secret discussions with the Germans on July 20–21,1939, the Slovaks also agreed to allow Germany to use its territory as the staging area for its troops. On August 26, the Slovak Republic mobilized its forces and established a new field army, codenamed Bernolák. Additionally,160,000 reservists were called up, with 115,000 entering service until September 20,1939 and it consisted of, 1st infantry division Jánošík led by Anton Pulanich in sector Spišská Nová Ves – Prešov. 2nd infantry division Škultéty led by Alexander Čunderlík in sector Brezno – Poprad, 3rd infantry division Rázus led by Augustín Malár in sector east of High Tatra. A motorized unit Kalinčiak was created on September 5 but the campaign ended before it arrived on the front, bernoláks task was to prevent a Polish incursion into Slovakia and to support German troops. Their opposition was the Polish Karpaty Army, which consisted of units with some light artillery support. The attack started on September 1,1939 at 5,00 a. m, the 1st division occupied the village of Javorina and the town of Zakopane, then continued toward Nowy Targ, protecting the German 2nd Mountain Division from the left. During September 4–5, it engaged in fighting with regular Polish army units, on September 7 the division stopped its advance,30 km inside Polish territory. Later, the division was pulled back, with one battalion remaining until September 29 to occupy Zakopane, Jurgów, the 2nd division was kept in reserve and participated only in mopping-up operations. In this it was supported by the Kalinčiak group, the 3rd division had to protect 170 km of the Slovak border between Stará Ľubovňa and the border with Hungary. It fought minor skirmishes, and after several days moved into Polish territory, two or three Slovak air squadrons were used for reconnaissance, bombing and close support for German fighters

12.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states

13.
Soviet invasion of Poland
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The Soviet invasion of Poland was a Soviet military operation that started without a formal declaration of war on 17 September 1939. On that morning,16 days after Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west, the joint German-Soviet invasion of Poland was secretly agreed in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, signed on 23 August 1939. The Red Army, which outnumbered the Polish defenders, achieved its targets by using strategic. Some 230,000 Polish prisoners of war had been captured, the campaign of mass persecution in the newly acquired areas began immediately. In November 1939 the Soviet government ostensibly annexed the entire Polish territory under its control, the Soviet campaign of ethnic cleansing began with the wave of arrests and summary executions of officers, policemen and priests. Soviet forces occupied eastern Poland until the summer of 1941, when they were out by the invading German army in the course of Operation Barbarossa. The area was under Nazi occupation until the Red Army reconquered it again in the summer of 1944, the Soviet Union enclosed most of the annexed territories into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. After the end of World War II in Europe, the USSR signed a new border agreement with the Polish communists on 16 August 1945. The USSR played a double game secretly engaging in talks with Germany. The terms were rejected, thus giving Josef Stalin a free hand in pursuing the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact with Adolf Hitler, the non-aggression pact contained a secret protocol dividing Northern and Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence in the event of war. One week after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, German forces invaded Poland from the west, north, Polish forces gradually withdrew to the southeast where they prepared for a long defence of the Romanian Bridgehead and awaited the French and British support and relief that they were expecting. On 17 September 1939 the Soviet Red Army invaded the Kresy regions in accordance with the secret protocol, at the opening of hostilities several Polish cities including Dubno, Łuck and Włodzimierz Wołyński let the Red Army in peacefully, convinced that it was marching on to fight the Germans. General Juliusz Rómmel of the Polish Army issued an order to treat them like an ally before it was too late. The result of the Paris Peace Conference did little to decrease the territorial ambitions of parties in the region, the border skirmishes of 1919 progressively escalated into the Polish–Soviet War in 1920. Following the Polish victory at the Battle of Warsaw, the Soviets sued for peace, the parties signed the formal peace treaty, the Peace of Riga, on 18 March 1921, dividing the disputed territories between Poland and Soviet Russia. In the aftermath of the agreement, Soviet leaders largely abandoned the cause of international revolution. The Conference of Ambassadors and the community recognized Polands eastern frontiers in 1923. Germany marched into Prague on 15 March 1939, in mid-April, the Soviet Union, Britain and France began trading diplomatic suggestions regarding a political and military agreement to counter potential further German aggression

14.
Fedor von Bock
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Fedor von Bock was a German field marshal who served in the German army during the Second World War. Bock commanded Operation Typhoon, the failed attempt to capture Moscow during the autumn. The Wehrmacht offensive was slowed by stiff Soviet resistance around Mozhaisk, and also by the rasputitsa, the Soviet counteroffensive soon drove the German army into retreat, and Bock—who recommended an earlier withdrawal—was subsequently relieved of command by Adolf Hitler. A monarchist, Bock was not heavily involved in politics, however, he also did not sympathize with plots to overthrow Adolf Hitler, and never filed protests over the treatment of civilians by the SS and his own troops. Bock was also outspoken, a privilege Hitler extended to him only because he had been successful in battle. Bock—along with his wife and his stepdaughter—were killed by a strafing British fighter-bomber on 4 May 1945 as they traveled by car toward Hamburg. Fedor von Bock was born in Küstrin, a city on the banks of the Oder River in the Province of Brandenburg. At the age of eight, Bock went to study at an academy in Berlin. The education emphasized Prussian militarism, and he became adept in academic subjects such as modern languages, mathematics. He spoke fluent French, and some English and Russian, at an early age, and largely due to his father, Bock developed an unquestioning loyalty to the state and dedication to the military profession. While not a brilliant theoretician, Bock was a highly determined officer, as one of the highest-ranking officers in the Reichswehr, he often addressed graduating cadets at his alma mater, which closed in 1920. His theme was always that the greatest glory that could come to a German soldier was to die for the Fatherland and he quickly earned the nickname Holy Fire of Küstrin. In 1905, Bock married Mally von Reichenbach, a young Prussian noblewoman, in 1908, Bock entered the War Academy in Berlin, and after a years study he joined the ranks of the General Staff. He soon joined the Army League and came to know Walther von Brauchitsch, Franz Halder, by the time World War I began in 1914, Bock was a captain, he served as a battalion commander in January and February 1916. He was decorated with Pour le Mérite, German Empires highest military decoration, Bock stayed on as an officer of the post-war Reichswehr, and rose through the ranks. The killings perpetrated by the Black Reichswehr were justified under the so-called Femegerichte system and these killings were ordered by the officers from Sondergruppe R. Several times Bock perjured himself in court when he denied that the Reichswehr had had anything to do with the Black Reichswehr or the murders they had committed. On 27 September 1923, Buchrucker ordered 4,500 men of the Black Reichswehr to assemble outside of Berlin as the first preparatory step toward a putsch

15.
Gerd von Rundstedt
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Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt was a Field Marshal in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II. Born into a Prussian family with a military tradition, Rundstedt entered the Prussian Army in 1892. During World War I, he served mainly as a staff officer, in the inter-war years, he continued his military career, reaching the rank of Colonel General before retiring in 1938. He was recalled at the beginning of World War II as commander of Army Group South in the invasion of Poland and he commanded Army Group A during the Battle of France, and was promoted to the rank of Field Marshal in 1940. He was relieved of command in December 1941, but was recalled in 1942, Rundstedt was aware of the various plots to depose Hitler, but refused to support them. After the war, he was charged with war crimes, but did not face due to his age. He was released in 1949, and died in 1953, Gerd von Rundstedt was born in Aschersleben, north of Halle in Prussian Saxony. He was the eldest son of Gerd Arnold Konrad von Rundstedt, the Rundstedts are an old Junker family that traced its origins to the 12th century and classed as members of the Uradel, or old nobility, although they held no titles and were not wealthy. Virtually all the Rundstedt men since the time of Frederick the Great had served in the Prussian Army, Rundstedts mother, Adelheid Fischer, was of Huguenot descent. He was the eldest of four brothers, all of whom became Army officers, Rundstedts education followed the path ordained for Prussian military families, the junior cadet college at Diez, near Koblenz, then the military academy at Lichterfelde in Berlin. Unable to meet the cost of joining a regiment, Rundstedt joined the 83rd Infantry Regiment in March 1892 as a cadet officer. The regiment was based at Kassel in Hesse-Kassel, which he came to regard as his home town and he undertook further training at the military college at Hannover, before being commissioned as a lieutenant in June 1893. He made an impression on his superiors. In 1896 he was regimental adjutant, and in 1903 he was sent to the prestigious War Academy in Berlin for a three-year staff officer training course. At the end of his course Rundstedt was described as an able officer. Well suited for the General Staff and he married Luise “Bila” von Goetz in January 1902 and their only child, Hans Gerd von Rundstedt, was born in January 1903. Rundstedt joined the General Staff of the German Army in April 1907 serving there until July 1914 and this division was part of XI Corps, which in turn was part of General Alexander von Klucks First Army. Rundstedt served as 22nd Divisions chief of staff during the invasion of Belgium, in December 1914, suffering from a lung ailment, he was promoted to Major and transferred to the military government of Antwerp

16.
Army Group South
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Army Group South was the name of two German Army Groups during World War II. It was first used in the 1939 September Campaign, along with Army Group North to invade Poland, in the invasion of Poland Army Group South was led by Gerd von Rundstedt and his chief of staff Erich von Manstein. Two years later, Army Group South became one of three groups into which Germany organised their forces for Operation Barbarossa. Army Group Souths principal objective was to capture Soviet Ukraine and its capital Kiev, Ukraine was a major center of Soviet industry and mining and had the good farmland required for Hitlers plans for the Lebensraum. To carry out these initial tasks its battle order included the First Panzer Group and the German Sixth, Seventeenth and Eleventh Armies, Luftlotte 1, the German Sixth Army, which fought in the destructive Battle of Stalingrad, was re-constituted and later made part of Army Group South. In preparation for Operation Blue, the 1942 campaign in southern Russia, in February 1943, Army Group Don and the existing Army Group B were combined and re-designated Army Group South. A new Army Group B became a major formation elsewhere, on 4 April 1944, Army Group South was re-designated Army Group North Ukraine. Army Group North Ukraine existed from 4 April to 28 September, in September 1944, Army Group South Ukraine was again re-designated Army Group South. At the end of World War II in Europe, Army Group South was again renamed, as Army Group Ostmark, Army Group Ostmark was one of the last major German military formations to surrender to the Allies

17.
Semyon Timoshenko
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Semyon Konstantinovich Timoshenko was a Soviet military commander and Marshal of the Soviet Union. Timoshenko was born into a peasant family at Furmanivka, in the Budjak region, in 1914, he was drafted into the army of the Russian Empire and served as a cavalryman on Russias western front. On the outbreak of the Russian Revolution in 1917, he sided with the Bolsheviks, joining the Red Army in 1918, during the Russian Civil War, Timoshenko fought on various fronts. His most important encounter occurred at Tsaritsyn, where he commanded a regiment, and met and befriended Joseph Stalin. This connection would ensure his rapid advancement after Stalin gained control of the Communist Party by the end of the 1920s, by the end of the Civil and Polish-Soviet Wars, Timoshenko had become the commander of the Red Army cavalry forces. Thereafter, under Stalin, he became Red Army commander in Byelorussia, in Kiev, in the northern Caucasus and then Kharkov, in 1939, he was given command of the entire western border region and led the Ukrainian Front during the Soviet occupation of eastern Poland. He also became a member of the Communist Partys Central Committee, as a loyal friend, Timoshenko survived Stalins Great Purge, to be left as the Red Armys senior professional soldier. In January 1940, Timoshenko took charge of the Soviet armies fighting Finland in the Soviet-Finnish War and this had begun the previous November, under the disastrous command of Kliment Voroshilov. Under Timoshenkos leadership, the Soviets succeeded in breaking through the Finnish Mannerheim Line on the Karelian Isthmus and his reputation increased, Timoshenko was made the Peoples Commissar for Defence and a Marshal of the Soviet Union in May, replacing Stalins crony Marshal Voroshilov as Commissar. During the critical period of the purge, Stalin had used Timoshenko as a military district commander who could hold key appointments while their incumbents were liquidated or exiled. Timoshenko was a competent but traditionalist military commander who saw the urgent need to modernise the Red Army if, as expected. Overcoming the opposition of more conservative leaders, he undertook the mechanisation of the Red Army. He also reintroduced much of the harsh discipline of the Tsarist Russian Army. In September, he was transferred to the Ukraine to replace Budyonny, in November and December 1941 Timoshenko organized major counter offensives in the Rostov region, as well as carving a bridgehead into German defenses south of Kharkov in January 1942. In May 1942, Timoshenko, with 640,000 men, after initial Soviet successes, the Germans struck back at Timoshenkos exposed southern flank, halting the offensive, encircling Timoshenkos armies, and turning the battle into a major Soviet defeat. General Georgy Zhukovs success in defending Moscow during December 1941 had persuaded Stalin that he was a better commander than Timoshenko, Stalin removed Timoshenko from front-line command, giving him roles as overall commander of the Stalingrad, then North-Western, Leningrad, Caucasus and Baltic fronts. After the war, Timoshenko was reappointed commander of the Baranovichi Military District, then of the South Urals Military District, in 1960, he was appointed Inspector-General of the Defence Ministry, a largely honorary post. From 1961 he chaired the State Committee for War Veterans and he died in Moscow in 1970

18.
Marshal of Poland
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Marshal of Poland is the highest rank in the Polish Army. It has been granted to six officers. At present, this rank is equivalent to a Field Marshal or General of the Army in other NATO armies, today there are no living Marshals of Poland, since this rank is bestowed only on military commanders who have achieved victory in war. In all, the following persons have served as Marshals of Poland

20.
Tadeusz Kutrzeba
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Tadeusz Kutrzeba was a general of the army during the Second Polish Republic. He served as a general in the Polish Army in overall command of Army Poznań during the 1939 German Invasion of Poland. Tadeusz Kutrzeba was born in Kraków, a part of Austria-Hungary and his father was a captain in the Imperial Austrian Army. In 1896, he was admitted to a school for children in Fischau near Wiener Neustadt. He then continued his studies in the city of Hranice, Kutrzeba completed his secondary education in 1903. He graduated with distinction from the Military Technical Academy in Mödling and was commissioned as a second lieutenant, on account of his performance in school, he was given the option of choosing the location of his first posting. He chose to return to his native Kraków where he was posted from 1906 to 1910, in 1910, Kutrzeba continued his military education in Vienna, studying engineering, and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant in 1911. From 1913 to 1914, he was posted to Sarajevo, where he witnessed the immediate catalyst for the outbreak of the First World War, at the outset of World War I, Kutrzeba commanded military forces in this Austro-Hungarian stronghold of Sarajevo. Later, he was sent to the Serbian front as a officer in the 2nd Mountain Artillery Brigade commanded by major general Ferdinand Komm. On 15 March 1915 he was sent to the Russian front as an officer for the German 24th Reserve Corps. During the middle of the war, he was promoted to the rank of captain, in June 1915, he was moved to the Italian front, where, among other posts, he was the inspector general of military fortifications in the Tyrol region. In July 1916, he was appointed as the chief of staff of engineers in the Archduke Eugene’s army group. In this capacity, he gained valuable experiences, not only by virtue of his assignment. On 1 August 1916 he was deployed to Transylvania, where he was appointed the general of Austro-Hungarian fortifications in the region. A month later, he was appointed an officer for the German 9th Army’s general staff. In April 1917, Kutrzeba returned to the Russian front as part of the German-led Austro-Hungarian 4th Army, as the army group was charged with protecting the Danube delta by the Black Sea, Kutrzeba used every opportunity to acquaint himself with practical military matters and coastal defense. In March 1918 he was appointed as the chief of staff of Austro-Hungarian forces at a base near the city of Brăila. During the invasion of Poland in 1939, General Kutrzeba commanded the Poznań Army, composed of four infantry divisions and he devised the Polish counterattack plan of the battle of Bzura and commanded the Poznań and Pomorze Armies during the battle

21.
Warszawa Army
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The Warszawa Army was one of the Polish armies to take part in the Polish Defensive War of 1939. Created on 8 September, eight days after the invasion begun, to defend the Polish capital Warsaw in the face of breakthrough by the German forces. On 3 September 1939 the Minister of the Army, general Tadeusz Kasprzycki, the city had been under constant attack by the Luftwaffe since the early morning of 1 September. The AA artillery had 86 pieces of artillery, as well as an unknown number of anti-aircraft machine guns. In addition there was an air force Pursuit Brigade which was equipped with 54 fighter aircraft, on the 5 and 6 September the air force and 11 batteries of anti-aircraft artillery were withdrawn to Lublin. Initially however parts of various units, primarily of Łódź Army. On 8 September General Juliusz Rómmel, the commander of the Łódź Army who had separated from his operational units. After 13 September Warsaw and Modlin were effectively surrounded, the only way the Polish units were able to reach the besieged area was through the Kampinos Forest between Warsaw and the Vistula river. On 22 September German forces cut through the lines of communication between Warsaw and Modlin. On 26 September, after heavy bombardment had cut off water and the population was starving. On 28 September the Polish forces in Warsaw capitulated, fort Modlin capitulated the following day, Commander, General Juliusz Rómmel Chief of staff, col Aleksander Pragłowski Deputy Commander, General Tadeusz Kutrzeba, was commander of Army Poznan - reached Warsaw 16 September. Commander of Warsaw Garrison, Walerian Czuma Commander, General Walerian Czuma, legia Akademicka - made up of students of the universities. Volunteer Units Elements of Army Poznań 25th Infantry Division, - elements fight through enemy lines 20 September. Elements of Army Pomorze 15th Infantry Division, -1500 survivors fight through 22 September, Pomorze Cavalry Brigade - survivors fight through 20 September. Julian Janowski, from 15 September Gen. Juliusz Zulauf Elements of Army Modlin 5th Infantry Division retreated from river Narew front 13 September, 20th Infantry Division - arrived from north 15 September 21st Infantry Regiment Children of Warsaw - separated from 8th Infantry Division, arrived 21 September. Commander, Gen. Wiktor Thommée - after 12 September, 36th Infantry Regiment Elements of Łódź Army arrived on 13 September. 30th Infantry Division Wołyńska Cavalry Brigade List of Polish armies in World War II Łódź Army Siege of Warsaw Battle of Modlin detailed history of September campaign, armie i samodzielne grupy operacyjne Wojska Polskiego 1939 WIEM Encyklopedia

22.
4th Army (Wehrmacht)
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The 4th Army was a field army of the Wehrmacht during World War II. The 4th Army was activated on 1 August 1939 with General Günther von Kluge in command and it took part in the Invasion of Poland of September 1939 as part of Army Group North, which was under Field Marshal Feodor von Bock. The 4th Army contained the II Corps and III Corps, each with two divisions, the XIX Corps with two motorized and one panzer divisions, and three other divisions, including two in reserve. Its objective was to capture the Polish Corridor, thus linking mainland Germany with East Prussia, during the attack on the Low Countries and France, the 4th Army, as part of Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedts Army Group A, invaded Belgium from the Rhineland. Along with other German armies, the 4th Army penetrated the Dyle Line, the then Major-General Erwin Rommel, who was under Kluge, contributed immensely to his victories. Kluge, who had been General of the Artillery, was promoted to Field Marshal along with others on 19 July 1940. The 4th Army took part in Operation Barbarossa in 1941 as part of Bocks Army Group Center and took part in the Battle of Minsk, on 19 December 1941, Kluge resigned along Bock and Field Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch. Kluge was replaced by General Ludwig Kübler, after the launching of Operation Blue, the 4th Army and the entire Army Group Center did not see much action, as troops were concentrated to the south. However, from 1943 on, as Army Group Center was in full retreat, the Red Armys campaign of autumn 1943, Operation Suvorov, saw the 4th Army pushed back towards Orsha. Between October and the first week of December, West Front had tried four times to take Orsha and had beaten off in furious battles by Fourth Army. In 1944 the 4th Army was holding defensive positions east of Orsha and Mogilev in the Belorussian SSR, occupying a bulging, the Soviet summer offensive of that year, Operation Bagration, commencing on 22 June, proved disastrous for the Wehrmacht, including the 4th Army. It was encircled east of Minsk and lost 130,000 men in 12 days since the start of Bagration, few units were able to escape westwards, after the battles in the rest of the summer, the army required complete rebuilding. During late 1944–45 the 4th Army, now under the command of Friedrich Hoßbach, was tasked with holding the borders of East Prussia. On the first week in November in Gumbinnen Operation, the 4th Army pushed back the Soviet forces in the Gumbinnen sector off all but a fifteen-mile by fifty-mile strip of East Prussian territory. The Soviet East Prussian Offensive, commencing on 13 January, saw the 2nd Army driven steadily backwards towards the Baltic coast over a period of two weeks and 4th Army threatened with encirclement, for defying their orders, both Hoßbach and Reinhardt are relieved of command. By 13 February, 3rd Belorussian Front had pushed 4th Army out of the Heilsberg triangle, meanwhile, the Headquarters, 4th Army became Headquarters, 21st Army

23.
11th Army (Soviet Union)
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The 11th Army was an army of the Red Army, formed four times. The first formation was a unit of the newly created Soviet armed forces. It was formed by the Bolsheviks on October 3,1918, in February 1919 it was dissolved and was again deployed in March 1919 as a subdivision of the Caspian-Caucasian Front. It took a prominent part in the sovietization of the three republics of the southern Caucasus in 1920–21, when Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia were brought within the orbit of Soviet Russia. In 1939 the 11th Army was formed in the Belarusian Special Military District from the former Minsk Army Group and it fought in the Soviet invasion of Poland, the Baltic Operation, the Demyansk Pocket, and the Battle of Kursk. The army disbanded in December 1943, since the Russian Republics Caucasus Front dissolved, it did not have a true successor organization. The Army of the North Caucasus, which was renamed 11th Army on October 3,1918, during the Russian Civil War the 11th Army fought against the White troops of General Anton Denikins Volunteer Army in the western part of the North Caucasus. It was the strength of the Caspian-Caucasian Army Group. On 27 April 1920 the 11th Army took Baku, the Bolsheviks then established the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan, as a Soviet republic in May 1920. This was the first country in the South Caucasus that the Bolsheviks seized control of, taking advantage of its quarrels with neighboring Armenia, the 11th Army had little difficulty in initially sovietizing Azerbaijan. Although it soon was embroiled in a fierce anti-Soviet insurgency, the army remained poised to advance into the two remaining republics, Armenian and Georgia. For the time being, however, the authorities in Moscow ordered the army to stand down while negotiations between Russia and Armenia were being carried out, in that brief span the Red Army did aid Armenian communists fighting against the Armenian government in the Ijevan region of Armenia. The head of the 11th Armys Revolutionary Military Council was Sergo Ordzhonikidze, the military leaders of the 11th Army were in 1921, V. P. Military decisions were supervised by the Armys Council of War and its members were in 1921, Sergey Kirov, Valerian Kuybyshev, J. P. Butyagin, K. A. Vesnik, Lukin, B. D. Mikhailov, Kvirkeliya, S. S. Eliava, by 1921, the 11th Red Army is characterized by the modern French historian Marie Broxup as a purely Russian army led by Russian commanders and Russian political cadres. In May 1921 the army lost its name and was integrated into the Caucasian Front, in 1939 the 11th Army was formed in the Belarusian Special Military District from the former Minsk Army Group. It took part in the Soviet invasion of Poland, in summer 1940 it became part of the Baltic Military District. It participated in operations as part of the Soviet Northwestern Front west and south-western of Kaunas

24.
5th Red Banner Army
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The 5th Army is a Russian Ground Forces formation in the Far East Military District. During the Soviet period it was known as the 5th Red Banner Army, in the disastrous first months of Barbarossa, the 5th Army was encircled and destroyed around Kiev. The 5th Army itself only advanced as far as East Prussia before it was moved east to take part in the Soviet attack on Japan. Since 1945 under the Soviet and now Russian flag it has formed part of the Far East Military District keeping watch on the border with the Peoples Republic of China, the 5th Army was created in August 1939 in the Special Kiev Military District from the Northern Army Group. In September 1939 the 5th Army took part in the Soviet invasion of Poland, the Army was originally placed under the command of I. G. The Army’s rifle divisions were assigned to cover the Lutsk-Rovno approaches to the Ukraine and were tasked to man the Kovel, Strumilov, the Army was stationed in barracks up to forty miles from the frontier, and would need three to four days to take up its positions. The Commander Southwestern Front, Mikhail Kirponos, decided to halt this with an attack into the flank of Panzer Group 1 using all the mobile forces – five mechanised corps. Potapov, now commanding the 5th Army, was ordered on 29 June to make attack on Panzer Group 1’s flank from the woods of Klevany. Amid these efforts, Kirponos managed to withdraw most of his Front to a new line almost on the old Soviet/Polish border, and prevented the Germans from rupturing the Soviet defensive line. By 7 September the 5th Army was threatened with being split in two by the Second Army coming from the east and the Sixth Army’s northern outflanking of Kiev. The Stavka refused permission initially for the 5th Army to withdraw, by 9 September Stalin had finally given authority for the 5th Army to withdraw but by then it was trapped, and on 20 September Potapov and his command group were taken prisoner. In the disastrous battle, the German forces encircled forces from the 5th, 21st, 26th, and 37th Armies, captured Kiev, and claimed 665,000 prisoners. The 5th Army was re-raised for the time in October 1941, under the command of Dmitri Lelyushenko. Recent sources give the actual re-raising date as 11 October 1941 and it included two rifle divisions and three tank brigades. Lelyuschenko was wounded and General L. A. Govorov took over, what thin reserves there were ran out, and Mozhaisk fell on 18 October. Later that year the Army took part in the Klin-Solnechogorsk offensive operation, eventually the 5th Army defeated the Germans near Zvenigorod, and the 2nd Guards Cavalry Corps forced itself into the German rear in a daring raid, making further advances possible. In Western Front directives of 6 and 8 January 1942, the 5th Army received orders to first outflank, however Govorovs rifle divisions were falling to below 2,500 each, and the Army ‘started to run out of steam. In April 1942 Govorov was posted to command the Leningrad Front, as part of the Western Front the 5th Army then took part in the Operation of Rzhev-Vyazma, including the Second Rzhev-Sychevka Offensive in November–December 1942

25.
Karpaty Army
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Karpaty Army, formed on 11 July 1939 under Major General Kazimierz Fabrycy, was created after Germany had annexed Czechoslovakia and created a puppet state of Slovakia. According to Polish historians Czesław Grzelak and Henryk Stańczyk, it consisted of two brigades, Lwów Brigade of National Defence and a Battalion Węgry. Altogether, Karpaty Army was made of 26 battalions,160 cannons and 16 planes, the main task of the army was to secure mountain passes in the Carpathians from Czorsztyn to Polish-Romanian border, and to protect the Centralny Okręg Przemysłowy industrial region. Furthermore, it was tasked with protection of southern wing of Kraków Army, in late August 1939, concentration of Karpaty Army was not yet completed, as it was to be fully operational only after the complete of mobilization of the Polish Army. Karpaty Army was the weakest of all Polish armies in 1939, lacking heavy equipment, since first hours of the war, Karpaty Army faced well-prepared Alpine German divisions, whose superiority was obvious. From 11 September 1939, it was commanded by General Kazimierz Sosnkowski, on September 1 in the morning, Karpaty Army was attacked in the area of Czorsztyn by the 4th Light Division of the Wehrmacht, supported by the 2nd Mountain Division. Backed by the Slovakian units, German divisions managed to break through Polish positions near Tymbark and Limanowa, as a result, Polish headquarters agreed for a withdrawal. In the first days of the invasion, Karpaty Army lacked reserve units, as its forces, the 24th I. D. The Army took heavy casualties retreating through the San river and was destroyed during the Battle of Lwów on September 20, Karpaty Army was commanded by General Kazimierz Fabrycy. His chief of staff was Colonel Witold Dzierżykraj-Morawski

26.
Lublin Army
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It was commanded by Maj. Gen. Tadeusz Piskor. Lublin Army was not part of prewar Polish operational plans and it was improvised when it became obvious that quickly advancing Wehrmacht armored and motorized units would reach the Vistula river line. Lublin Army was tasked with defending the crossings of the Vistula river from Modlin to Sandomierz in the south, Polish planners wanted to reinforce it with elements of the Prusy Army, which after the Battle of Radom had retreated from German encirclement, and managed to cross the Vistula. These elements, however, were of military value, and were ordered to concentrate near Chelm. Instead, Lublin Army received 39th Reserve Infantry Division and improvised Sandomierz Group, Lublin Army came into contact with the enemy on September 8, near Gora Kalwaria and Deblin. After the first clash, the Germans concentrated their efforts on eliminating the remnants of Prusy Army, on September 12, the Wehrmacht advanced in the area of Annopol and Solec nad Wisla. Under its pressure, Polish forces retreated towards Krasnik, where merged with Krakow Army. The Army was commanded by general Tadeusz Piskor, his chieff of staff was colonel Jan Zawisza, units, Warsaw Armoured Motorized Brigade Polish 39th Infantry Division Smaller units Armie i samodzielne grupy operacyjne Wojska Polskiego 1939 WIEM Encyklopedia

27.
Modlin Army
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Modlin Army was one of the Polish armies that took part in the Invasion of Poland in 1939. Named after Fort Modlin, it was created on March 23,1939 with the task of defending the Polish capital of Warsaw. When the Germans invaded on September 3, not all of the fortifications had been completed. During the Battle of the Border the Army was pushed back by the German Third Army, towards the Narew and it received reinforcements in the form of the Operational Group Wyszków under General Wincenty Kowalski, but they were not sufficient to stop it from having to fall back. The army was commanded by brig. gen, emil Krukowicz-Przedrzymirski, his chief of staff was col. It consisted of 2 infantry divisions and 2 cavalry brigades, on a lower level of organization it had 28 infantry battalions,37 cavalry squadrons,180 artillery pieces,12 anti-air artillery pieces,1 armored train and 28 planes

28.
Pomorze Army
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The Pomeranian Army was one of the Polish armies to take part in the Invasion of Poland of 1939. It was officially created on March 23,1939, Władysław Bortnowski, it consisted of 5 infantry divisions,2 National Defence brigades and 1 cavalry brigade. The Army was tasked to defend Toruń and Bydgoszcz from a possible German attack, the Pomorze Army suffered severe losses during the Battle of Tuchola Forest, losing about a third of its strength. In retreat towards Warsaw from September 6, it subordinated itself to Army Poznań, the Army was commanded by General Władysław Bortnowski, his chief of staff was Colonel Ignacy Izdebski. The composition of the Pomorze Army, Polish army order of battle in 1939 Armie i samodzielne grupy operacyjne Wojska Polskiego 1939 WIEM Encyklopedia

Werner Goldberg (1919 – 2004), who was blond and blue-eyed, was used in Wehrmacht recruitment posters as the "ideal German soldier". He was later "dismissed" after it became known that he was a "Mischling ersten Grades" as defined by the Nuremberg Laws, having half Jewish ancestry.